We Are Young
by TheCivilState
Summary: Even when everyone else is gone, they'll still have each other.  Klaroline.


_He'd look just like you'd want him to_

_Some slick chrome American prince_

He stood leaning against the bar with his brother when Caroline blew in. Her hair was a mess from the wind outside, but it's not like anyone cared or would even notice for that matter. Elena was playing pool with Bonnie and Matt and so long as little Miss Elena Gilbert was around, Caroline would always be second fiddle.

"I decided not to ask this time," Klaus said, slipping a drink into her hand, "You refused me last time and well, we know how last time went." She smirked and cocked her head at him, stepping around and joining his brother at the bar.

"I'm Caroline," she said, giving him a wave before knocking back her drink. He took his hand and pressed a kissed to him.

"I'm enchanted." Somewhere in the background noise she could hear someone growling. She liked to think it was Klaus. Even if he was a creepy Original hybrid and so off-limits, it was nice to think someone like him noticed someone like her.

After all, he did say she was more beautiful than a princess. He couldn't be all bad, right?

_Change came in disguise of a revelation, set his soul on fire_

_She said she always knew he'd come around_

"You left this at my house." Caroline found the bracelet Klaus had given her dangling in front of her face as she walked to her car. She brushed his hand away, but he caught her wrist and fastened the bracelet there before she could protest.

"Seriously?" she said, "Are you that dense? Take a hint, Klaus, and leave me alone." She turned on her heel and stomped to her car, unlocking it and tossing her purse onto the passenger seat.

"Nik," he called after her, "I prefer to be called Nik."

Caroline didn't turn around. She went home and practiced saying his name.

_The decades disappear like sinking ships_

_But we persevere _

"Are you still here?" Klaus was surprised to see Caroline sitting in a bar on the outskirts of Mystic Falls. Not in Mystic Falls because, after all, she was a perpetual teenager who looked a good fifteen years younger than her graduating class. Not that she was keeping track.

"It's not like I have anywhere else to go," she said, knocking back her drink with a practiced ease developed over the years, "I imagine you're in town to get more blood from Elena?" He smiled and slipped onto the stool beside her, ordering the same drank as she. She tried not to notice and failed miserably. They hadn't seen each other in almost a decade since his last visit to Elena and yet her stomach was still performing acrobatics and she was worried she'd say something stupid like, _Absence makes the heart grown fonder, right?_

"What makes you think I'm in town for Elena?" he asked, clinking his glass against hers. She'd spent the last fifteen years practicing his name and now she finally had a chance to use it. Finally had a chance to use the line she'd been rehearsing every night since he'd left Mystic Falls.

"Hey Nik," she said casually as if this wasn't a big deal, "You said something about Paris, right?"

_Saw Cinderella in a party dress, she was looking for a nightgown_

They saw Paris. And Rome. Tokyo and Berlin. She liked Spain and the way it sounded when people called her beautiful. No one every said it the way Nik did though. But eventually, Mystic Falls beckoned her home with the marriage of one Jeremy Gilbert to one Bonnie Bennett.

"Didn't you enjoy the party?" Nik asked her later that evening as she slipped from her party dress and tossed it over the back of a chair. She didn't care if it creased or wrinkled or was completely ruined. She'd just buy a new one. That's what she always did. Replace the old with the new and it seemed her friends had the same mentality.

"Is it so wrong for me to think we'd be best friends forever?" she said, "Or at least best friends until we died?" She'd been excited to see her old friends again, but the excitement had died when she realized they had built a life without her. She didn't belong with them anymore and it hurt standing on the outside of that circle as they reminisced about moments she had missed while gallivanting around the world with Nik.

"Do you regret it?" he asked, taking her hand in his and pressing a kiss to her forehead. She shook her head and buried herself against his chest, fingers clutching at his shirt.

"I knew this would happen one day," she said, "I just didn't think it would happen so soon."

"No one ever does, darling, but it happens. This is life. This is what it means to be a vampire."

In that moment, they had each other.

It was enough.

_Why don't you know the kingdoms under siege and everybody needs you_

_[song fic inspired by "Dustland Fairytale" by The Killers]_


End file.
